Calvados Adrien Camut 6 Ans, Pays D’Auge

Calvados Adrien Camut 6 Ans is a Calvados with a minimum age of 6 years produced in the Pays d’Auge, the easternmost region of the Calvados region, and regarded by many as the finest region for apples in France.

The Camut family is a grower and distiller who has been producing calvados on their Pays d’Auge estate for almost 200 years. The family were at the forefront of the development of Calvados and the marketing of fine aged spirits to the resurgent restaurant scene that followed the end of World War II in France.

The estate, which is located at La Lande-Saint-Leger, is planted with about 4,000 traditional hi-stemmed apple tree varieties. There are over 800 apple varieties grown in Normandy and Camut uses at least 25 of these including Bedan, Bisquet, Frequin Rouge, Marin Onfroy de Honfleur, Marin Onfroy de Roumois, Grise Dieppois, Doux Verret de Carrouge, Binet Rouge, Saint Martin, Doux Coët-Ligné, Joly Rouge, Sans Pareille, Bergerie de Villerville, Herbage sec, François, Rever, Forge Patin, Argile Rouge Bruyère, Argile Nouvelle and Clos Renaux. This blend of varieties give balance to the cider and subsequent distilled spirit.  No pesticides are ever used and the cider is aged in oak barrels until the following September when distillation commences.

It was Adrien Camut who perfected the family’s distillation methods using the domaine’s different pot stills, the eldest from the 1920’s, and the most recent from 1975, to produce Calvados with both the power and finesse to withstand long ageing in oak. The spirit is casked in used barrels at roughly 62 % alcohol and is reduced to about 50% during the first two years of ageing. The spirit is moved constantly during its youth with the barrels kept no more than 75% full; this increases the natural oxidation processes, the natural reduction in strength and the development of the flavours. After this initial ageing the brandy is moved to larger casks where it slumbers for many years before bottling without filtration.

Calvados Adrien Camut 6 Ans is a great as an after dinner drink or with chocolate desserts.